et ready for giant monsters vs. colossal robots, Round 2: Writer-director Guillermo del Toro is working on a script for a sequel to his 2013 sci-fi film "Pacific Rim.".

"I'm working very, very hard with Zak Penn," Del Toro told BuzzFeed at the Austin Television Festival over the weekend. "We've been working for a few months now in secret. We found a way to twist it around."

by Steven Zeitchik

Del Toro added that finance and production company Legendary Pictures has not formally agreed to make the film, but that he and Penn ("X-Men: The Last Stand," "The Incredible Hulk") are writing the script as if it will see the light.

"I don't have the money, but I'm proceeding like it is happening," Del Toro said, adding that he hopes to make "Pacific Rim 2" after his next producing project.

Released last July, the original "Pacific Rim" tells the story of a future in which giant monsters called kaiju have emerged from an undersea portal and begun laying waste to coastal cities. To fight back, the military creates 25-story robots operated by two pilots who control the machine via a psychic bond.

The $190-million film did only moderate business in the U.S., where it just crossed the $100 million mark, but it earned positive reviews and also flourished overseas, taking in an additional $309 million.

Back in April, discussing the possibility of a sequel, Legendary principal Thomas Tull told The Times, "We love ['Pacific Rim'] and we love working with Guillermo del Toro. We would continue working on it, but we wouldn't do it just to do it."

Del Toro said the sequel script picks up where the first movie left off and includes the characters Raleigh Becket (Charlie Hunnam) and Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi).

"Some people were wondering if we were going to do the prequel," Del Toro said. "I was never interested in doing that first wave of invasion. I'm going for very new, very crazy ideas on the second one, which are very different from the first one — but you will get really great spectacle."

I think the biggest thing against the first one was name recognition. It's sad, but we live in a world where most movies are rehashes or adaptations of recognizable properties. For all the goofy simplicity of "giant robots fighting giant monsters", the general public doesn't seem to know what to make of something anymore if they don't recognize the name. But this means the sequel may actually do better business.Personally, I'd like to see Guillermo go back to doing smaller more personal movie between his big budget blockbusters.

Yeah, but pretty dumb movies have made LOTS of money. What's the difference between this, Transformers, and Godzilla? Name recognition. And even without a recognizable name, there's the fact it's title didn't really make any sense as a title. It'd be like calling Monster's Inc. "Doors".

Charlie Hunnam steps out in character on the set of his series Sons of Anarchy on Monday afternoon (June 16) in Los Angeles.

The 34-year-old actor starred in the movie Pacific Rim and now director Guillermo del Toro is telling Buzzfeed about his plans for the sequel.

“I’m working very, very hard with [screenwriter] Zak Penn,” Guillermo said. “We’ve been working for a few months now in secret. We found a way to twist it around. Travis Beacham [co-writer of the first film, now working on Fox’s Hieroglyph] was involved in the storyline and now I’m writing with Zak because Travis has become a TV mogul.”

“Some people were wondering if we were going to do the prequel. I was never interested in doing that first wave of invasion,” he added. “I’m going for very new, very crazy ideas on the second one, which are very different from the first one — but you will get really great spectacle.”

Pacific Rim 2 is officially a “go”. Though director Guillermo del Toro’s 2013 “monsters vs. robots” film was in no way a box office disaster, the colorful, bombastic epic failed to catch on with general audiences in Transformers fashion. It just squeaked past the $100 million mark stateside, but fared much better internationally, bringing its worldwide total to $411 million. Fans (myself included) hoped this would be enough to convince Legendary Pictures to greenlight a sequel, and we’ve been hearing more updates on the follow-up in the past few months.Most recently, del Toro revealed that he’s writing the Pacific Rim 2 script with Zak Penn (X2), and now the filmmaker has announced that the pic will hit theaters on April 7, 2017 in IMAX 3D. Moreover, he revealed that an animated series set within the Pacific Rim world will be unveiled sometime before that date. More after the jump.

Pacific Rim 2 is officially a “go”. Though director Guillermo del Toro’s 2013 “monsters vs. robots” film was in no way a box office disaster, the colorful, bombastic epic failed to catch on with general audiences in Transformers fashion. It just squeaked past the $100 million mark stateside, but fared much better internationally, bringing its worldwide total to $411 million. Fans (myself included) hoped this would be enough to convince Legendary Pictures to greenlight a sequel, and we’ve been hearing more updates on the follow-up in the past few months.Most recently, del Toro revealed that he’s writing the Pacific Rim 2 script with Zak Penn (X2), and now the filmmaker has announced that the pic will hit theaters on April 7, 2017 in IMAX 3D. Moreover, he revealed that an animated series set within the Pacific Rim world will be unveiled sometime before that date. More after the jump.

So I guess it's really happening. Thanks China!

WaHOO!

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